So it has been a long time since I have last posted anything. My collegiate frisbee career is now over, Northern Lights finished 7th in the region, a slightly disappointing finish to what was looking like a possible upset run into nationals. That being said I managed to graduate from UMD with a major in History and a minor in Spanish in 4 years. This is very much so a mixed blessing as I miss Duluth, and the NL boys a ton, especially after their performance at EC Chill out. However, I really could not afford more student loans aaaaaaaannnnnnnnd the frodaddy, is now going to bea real daddy!! yes that is correct I have my first child on the way. So that being said my blog will now take on a much different tone as I will now discuss the challenges that face a first time father as well as various other musings that cross my mind, however, I will still be incolved in Ultimate and I fully intend on continuing to post ultimate related matieral when I have some. That is all for now.

~Fro

Spring Break Preview

Spring break 2009 is right around the corner, and I personally cannot wait for. This year Northern Lights will be hitting up 3 tournaments, Terminus, High Tide Session III, and the Chicago Invite. All of these tournaments will be very important to the future success of the team. As of right now we are 3 seed in our pool for Terminus which includes Tennessee, who upset Wisconsin at Vegas, and Cornell. My car will almost assuredly miss these games due to our late departure on Friday. hopefully we will be around for the last 2 rounds. We then drive a few more hours south and hit up High Tide, a little bit more of a laid back atmosphere, but an important tournament non the less. Don't be surprised if UMD wins this tournament. Finally we begin the long drive back up to Duluth with a quick pit stop in Chicago for the Chicago invite. I wish I had seedings for you now but they have yet to be released. More info to come.

~Fro baby

Vegas '09

Vegas BABY! the norhtern lights just back from one of the biggest tournaments of our collegiate careers. Holy Shit did this tournament take it's toll on the team, and the weather did nothing to help the team moral when we were down. Rain, in the fucking desert, REALLY!?!?

Most of the team arrived in Vegas thursday morning ready for the debauchery that Vegas had to offer. We managed to boot fake our way to Circus Circus, and luckily we didn't find any coke fags in our rooms. The team quickly decides to hit up the black jack tables. Some people quickly found lady luck in Sin City, others lost money right away. However, there were a few of us on the team who had no real interest in gambling and only wanted to get free drinks. Well since I am now aware of the easiest way to do this I will educate all of you so you don't repeat my same mistake. See I originally thought the easiest way to get drinks was to sit at slot machiences and wait for a cocktail waitress to come and bring you a drink. Little did I know that the easiest and most cost effective way to get drinks was to sit at the bar and play video poker...I had no idea, it was fucking fantastic. Well since we are in vegas for a frisbee tournament most of us try to go to bed not to drunk and at a decent hour..let's just say thank God Vegas is 2 hours behind MN time.

Friday morning: The team ends up arriving at the fields later than we expected/liked. Luckily for us we were playing Western Washington B first. This game was good for us as it let us warm up and keep lines open as well as let us get back into the grove of playing outdoors. The game went for the most part as we planned. we are able to work out the kinks..and trust me there were a lot, but UMD comes out victorious with a 13-9, or 13-8 win.

Utah State was up next, this too proved to be a fairly easy win with Duluth having it's way the their defense, and Utah State was unable to figure out our zone. by this point in the day the wind had really come out, it was drizzling on and off, and we were beginning to wonder if we really were in a desert.

We go into our next game with the hopes and expectations that we would go 3-0 on the day, however the tournament got a lot harder when we finally played a team that new how to play zone defense. due to a lot of mental errors on our part as well as better play on the part of Humbolt State, UMD gets their asses kicked 13-5. Most of the team sticks around to watch the final round of pool play We watch UBC vs. Cal santa Barbra, and realized that we need to tone down our mistakes and we will be able to play with the best teams in the nation.

We make it back to our hotel to shower and eat at the circus magercus buffet. This was a terrible idea. The food sucked so much and after having paid 15 bucks most of us were pretty upset. Those of us that are able to went out and gambled and drank and got way to little sleep. We all knew that Saturday morning would be coming way too soon.

Saturday morning we opened with Colorado Mines. We quickly realized that these guys were pretty shitty and we take advantage of their shittyness as quickly as possible, we beat them 13-9. The highlight for me in this game was a lay out D in the endzone and a huge OI flick huck for a goal to Josh. As a whole at this point the team is starting to find our groove or so we thought. We did not get any byes today, and had the opportunity to play 7 straight games. but next up was UC Davis.

UC Davis. these guys were tallented and were able to capitalize on our mistakes early and often. we got down on ourselves pretty early and were never really able to bounce back from the hole we were in. There are a number of reasons for this a big one being that it was a straight down pour in the middle of the fucking desert!! it was some bull shit, this made playing extremley difficult. Jake attempted to get the team fired up by spiking the disk after he scored a goal. Well the UC Davis Player took offense and spiked it back and said "Fuck your spike!" This ended up being comical and really did not fire us up. We end up having to do some soul searching after this game as we are informed that we are done playing for the day.

We all got back into the vans headed back to Circus Circus showered up and decided what do do with half a day still in Vegas. Some people decide to go gamble and drink, some of us head back to the fields to watch some more ultimate. We saw some sloppy ultimate, as it was still a down pour, and the fields were quickly turning into a marsh. It gets dark so we head to the Rio for bomb ass seafood buffet. Then we head to the strip club, I won't go into details on the strip club but it sucked!

Sunday, was a rough day, we were informed that we were in a 4 team pool meaning we were going to be 1 game short playing our 9 guaranteed games. early on in our first game on Sunday I pulled my hamstring and was done playing for the tournament. By the time we finished playing we had finally started gel and figure out our zone offense. All in all it was a successful tournament. We have Terminus, High Tide, and Chicago Invite up next. these will most likely be our last tournaments before the series. it should be an interesting spring, especially with Spring break only 2 weeks away.

~Fro

Missouri does not Love Company

Every time Duluth goes to a tournament in Missouri, weird shit always seems to go down. Last year it was the Coke-fag room, and this year was no different. Well I drove my car down and we got down to Missouri at a farley decent time, however half our team didn't arrive until after 2 in the morning with one car getting in at 430 AM. So the morning comes and Duluth looks pretty groggy, and tired. We end up not getting to the fields as early as most of us would have liked.

Game 1: CUT
Well, the previous game our team had with CUT we got 0atbagged, so needless to say they were deffinatly overlooking us and we were trying to make a statment. Well lets just say we didn't make a statement and CUT played pretty strong, with games to only 11 it is tough to make any sort of comeback. The weather was deffinatly a factor as it was probably just as warm in Duluth, anyways the late warm up as well as the weather contributed to Duluth getting crushed 11-2.... I wasn't incredibly impressed with CUT however we had too many mistakes to really make any sort of statment this game...Duluth now had a bye, and we were set to watch the CUT-Colorado game. It was a pretty good game, that wasn't too bogged down with calls, both CUT and Mamabird moved the disc really really efficently, neither zone was able to really slow down the others offense. 1 mistake cost CUT the game, as Mamabird was able to score their upwind break and take the lead, from there things traded with Colorado never giving up the break.

Game 2: Mamabird
This is the other game of power pools that Duluth had been looking forward to. This was another game against a National semi-finalist. We were able to get a better warm up and thanks to watching the game we had a pretty good idea of what Colorado wanted to do...break the mark, handlers go up line, and isolate their cutters in space, they ran a side stack very similar to the one that Stolaf runs, as well as CUT. Our Junk 3-3-1 zone worked pretty well at slowing them down, but they are a very patient team and were able to work it around pretty easily. I will also say that Mac Taylor is a very good player with sick throws, I was suprised at his height and his ability to step around the mark and stay balanced. We had some pretty big defenive problems this game, we got beat to the force side, and we let their handlers go upline on us alomst at will, those 2 things alone will lose you a game against any team, but even more so against a team that finish tied for 3rd at Nationals last year. Once again due to too many mistakes Duluth loses, 4-10.

Game 3: Washington Univeristy (St. Louis, MO).
Duluth has played these guys before, and things were tight not too contenious but Wash U yelled at each other a lot and we were able to capitalize on their self-destruciton. This game was slightly different, we played pretty swell under the rally cry of they took our bye...which they actually did, they called the TD and requested to get a first round bye so they could stay in St. Louis and sleep....what a bunch of fucking queers, anyways the game is on serve for awhile we get down a few breaks and end up losing 7-10...we played pretty well this game, we had a couple of defensive break downs that led to us losing this game.

Game 4:Wisconsin Whitewater
We have started to develop a pretty friendly rivalry with these guys, they are pretty spirited and deffinatly really talented. I really enjoy playing these guys well due to a number of factors we lost this game 4-11...fatigue had really set in, and we really wanted our 1 piece of pizza.....So we attempt to go and find some food...

Well due to our inability to find a steak and shake most of us ended up at Hardees for dinner, we then proceeded to go back to our hotel most of us intended on going to bed really early, well after a nice soak in the hot tub, most of us got ready for bed. Well a good chunk of the team went to bed, one car went to see quantum of solace. I was all set to watch some college football and go to bed for the night when Izzy comes in and informs me that there are some sexy laydsss, in the pool and that they were setting up for a photo shoot. Well I wanted to check it out real quick so I walk outside to see what is going on. I walked by the pool area and sure enough there were three girls were sitting in the hot tub, while these fat old guys were setting up lights and had cameras. So eventually we just posted up in front of the glass and began to watch the show. Well it starts off with just glamour shots, and eventually myself, Perkna, Dave, Izzy, and Benny, began to talk about what happens if they start to get naked. Well right around this time we ended up seeing a nipple slip, and it was hillarious cause she didn't realize it at first, she blushed and laughed and then went back to work, well after having been teased by this one nipple we thought maybe we would get lucky and see a slip again. Well we didn't have to wait long till the tops just came off all together. Needless to say we were shocked, and awed, and Dave had it in his mind that he had to write a note to the Ladies. Well right about the time I was about to go get him some paper and a pen, 2 of the sexy laydsss came out and asked us if we were enjoying the show. Somehow between the five of us we were able to spit out a coherent response that made them giggle. Well as they came back, Izzy somehow finds it in him, and spits out this sentance. Izzy "Hey laydiessssssss, listen we are from Minnesota, and we play ultimate frisbee, we had a rough day of games and it would really really brighten up our day if you could take a picture with us. It would be our good luck charm and we would pwn noobs all day tomorrow." The Laydiesss quickly agreed and pretty soon we had a pick with laydiesssssssss at which point I went to bed, but Dave had to express his love and gratitude to the girls, he proceded to write his note, and get one of the girls numbers. Jake is terrified in his sleep as he sees the twinkle in my eye that says I am going to molest him in his sleep.

Sunday Morning, more Jimmy Dean sausages, the team actuall manages to get out of the hotel in a timley fasion, and we realize that we have the Kansas Horrizontalls for our pre-quarters game.

Game 5: Horrizontals, this was by far the weirdest warm up I have ever had playing any sport ever...for whatever reason the Kansas team decided that they wanted to split the field hotdog style, which I found to be very bizzare but whatever, we had a nice long warm up, which was a nice change from the day before. We flip and we get set to go. This Kansas team is a very interesting one that is talented but seems to lack the killer instinct as well as team unity that you need to really establish a program as a top tier. Duluth Manages to get rolling early, we go up 3-0quickly before Kansas really knew what hit them, they manage to score their downwind O point to make the score 3-1, we go on to score our O point and the score is 4-1, we trade till we reach 6. Kansas goes on a run, and they are able to bring it to 6-4. we score to take half which is 7-4, We know the cap is probably looming but this does not deter us. We knew we had to bring the intensity way up, unfortunatly Kansas is starting on O and they score fairly quickly to make it 7-5. our 0ffense quickly gets broken upwind and the score is now 7-6. Our offense then proceeds to work the disc downwind and score to make it 8-6, still no need to panic or be concerned, all we have to do is just make sure that we score all of our O points which are now downwind and the game is ours..well du to a colarado players concern I went to go check to see when Cap went on, and by the time I got back it Kansas was working on tying the game and sending it to universe point. Which they did. We put out a stud line with trosvergers and Ryan Perrkarrrna. Duluth recieves the disc going upwind, Jake breaks his mark to the upwind side and gets the Disc to trosvergers on the upwind side. While this is going on, Perkarrrrna is streaking deep, with his defender only one step behind, Trosvig releases a huge forehand huck, well it ends up floating but Perkarrrrrna decides that he is going to make his defender is bitch by putting his nuts in his face a ripping down the game winning goal. Northern Lights is now in the quarter finals against Mamabird...again.

Quarter finals: Mamabird, This game was a lot different from pool play...Mamabird came out with a different intensity and swagger that we had not seen, they were not looking past our team, they were looking to use our match up as a chance to plow us into the ground. While things stayed spirited, I was amazed at this supposed elite team how many people on their team did not know the rules. Maybe they just assume the obeservesr in C-1 are going to take care of that shit for them, but a contested foul does not drop the count 2 or 3 you fucking noobs!!! Anyways, we get destroyed and end up with what ammounts to a half round bye, as we watch Iowa, and CUT finish their game.

Game 7: Texas State, wow where to begin with these mother fuckers, I know that I said that North Texas was the most unspirited team I have ever played... however, Texas State, is the by far the worst spirited team I have ever played against..god were these guys pricks*. Things really quickly broke down with these guys, the breaking point came when there was a discussion about whether a disc was down or up, Trosvig said it was down I said it was down, and their entire team including their sidline said that the disc was up, they called Izzy fucking retarted, as well as a moron...they also did not know the rule that on a disputed call like the disc being down. So finally after a 10+ minute discussion the disc gets sent back, they proceed to score, and things get more and more heated, on our next down wind O point things finally reached a boiling point when Texas State, turned the disc out of bounds, I went to pick up the disc and the next thing I know Spudders, aka the porn star, is being held back by one of my team mates, and #23 from Texas State is being held back by his. Apparently what had happend was the disc was thrown out of bounds, Budick went to clear into the stack, as he was clearing, #23 from Texas State lowered his shoulder right into Spudder's chest. Budick was knocked down as a result of this action, when he got back up he was fairly angry. So he got up and pushed #23, and that is when I turned around and saw what I saw. Both players were sent of the field to calm down wich ended up working, during this time our Mckean went over to their coach, and had a quick discussion, and said that we are not playing a minute after the round is over. After this discussion things clamed down quite a bit, two thumbers were thrown, one by a Texas State player, the other by Trosvergers. We end up losing this 6-10. But this was not a fun game, I hope that people who watched this game did not take this as an accurate portrayal of the sport.

Final game: North Texas, man could this have gone baaaaad, first our game with Texas State, then North Texas. Luckily, this team was pretty worn out and it seemed as though things have changed with these guys, but I could be wrong. We are still playing open lines with our limited numbers, we get them to agree to a game to 10. We quickly score our 0 point and get a break which set us up perefectly to win the game, so long as we continue to score our down wind 0 points, we end up doing this and winning our game 10-8. This was a nice way to end our fall season, we go out with a win over a team we failed to beat all of last spring, however, now our record from the fall is meaningless. Us Northern Teams are indoors, teams are going to condtion, and lift. Teams will look very different in the Spring and so will the Northern Lights. I am very excited about the future of this team, especially this spring. We have a great opportunity ahead of us, we have the talent, we have the drive, now all we have to do is put forth those things to a common goal. I hope to be able find something to post on so that I won't be inactive till MLK, however nothing is for certain at this point.

~Fro #23







*The views expressed in this blog in no way shape or form reflect the attitudes or opinions of UMD Northern Lights Ultimate, they are the barley coherent rantings/opionons of one of it's members.

MLC preview

Well let me just say that it has been far too long since I have had the opportunity to post and am glda that we finally have a tournament coming up. Next weekend is Missouri Loves Company (MLC). I am really excited for this tournament but a little nervous as we do not have quite the commitment that I was hoping for. as of right now we are rolling down to MO with 18 guys I would feel a little more confident if we had about 20 guys but I do think that these lower numbers will result in myself getting a lot more PT. Pools have been announced for this tournament and I could not be more excited We have both CUT, and Mamabird in our pool, this is where we have wanted to be since last year. It seems as though we are finally getting the shot we have always wanted. It is awsome that guys are finally taking notice of what Duluth Ultimate has done. This is in part due to the fact that a lot of guys on the team have finally started working out outside of practice, and I think that this will finally start to show this weekend.
Duluth has started indoor practices now, and it fucking sucks, I hate the field hose with a passion!! the surfface sucks it is hard on the knees, guys always seem to get hurt, I really hope that everyone stays healthy and that people don't end up getting to banged up, the easiest way for this to happen is if guys continue to lift outside of practice, the added muscle will help to improve their durability. That is all I got for now.

~Fro #23